Pros
- Contains L-Citrulline
- Green Tea Extract can boost metabolism
Cons
- Missing key pre-workout nutrients (eg. Caffeine Anhydrous & Creatine Monohydrate)
- Contains artificial sweeteners
- Not likely to provide much of an energy boost
See Your Best Options In Our
– Top 3 Pre-Workouts Page –
About The Product
Serum is a pre-workout/fat burner supplement made by Outbreak Nutrition. It costs $34.99 for 25 serving containers, so it’s pretty well priced.
Our first impressions are good overall. Serum contains some great ingredients, and we’re especially happy to see that Outbreak Nutrition added L-Citrulline, which can really help pump-up your muscles.
But we personally don’t always agree with ‘hybrid’ supplements; we prefer to choose specialist supplements targeted at delivering 1 goal, as these specialist supplements have been more reliable for us in the past.
Anyway, we’ll expand on this as we analyze Serum’s nutrient profile in the next section. But first, we’ll tell you more about the company behind it.
Who are Outbreak Nutrition?
Outbreak Nutrition are a supplements company based in the USA. They have a running theme for their brand, focusing on a fictional ‘apocalypse’, so their containers usually contain pictures of gas masks etc.
We hadn’t really seen this company around before 2016-17, so we’re not sure which year they were founded; this information is not shown to you on their ‘about us’ page on their website either.
Apart from that, there isn’t a great deal of information about this company. But none of this affects the quality of Serum, so let’s see which ingredients have been added inside.
Serum Ingredients Explained
One of the best things about Serum, is that its ingredients list is very transparent and clear; no ingredients have been hidden in any proprietary blends, which is great to see.
Also, Outbreak Nutrition has done well to not add an overload of ingredients into Serum. Instead, they’ve chosen 6 main ingredients to fill this pre-workout/fat burner supplement, which is more than enough.
But one slight criticism we have, is that there are no ingredients that will really give you a ‘kick’ in the gym; this is essentially a non-stimulant pre-workout, as Green Tea Extract doesn’t always offer enough caffeine. We also would have liked to see other key pre-workout ingredients such as Creatine Monohydrate.
Anyway, we’ll take you through each ingredient inside Serum. By the end of this review, you’ll have a good idea of how safe and effective this pre-workout/fat burner really is.
Here’s Everything You Need To Know:
L-Citrulline
L-Citrulline can be a key addition to any pre-workout supplement; it’s proven to help enhance your muscle pumps, due to being able to raise your nitric oxide levels.
Now, not only does this help you look and feel great, muscle pumps also reduce muscular damage and fatigue due to more blood and oxygen being pumping into your muscles.
Outbreak Nutrition has obviously done their research, as Serum contains an optimal dosage of L-Citrulline (over 3,000mg per serving).
If we were being extremely picky, then we would personally have preferred to see Citrulline Malate instead; this is simply L-Citrulline bound with Malic Acid, which is able to raise your ATP levels in a similar manner to Creatine Monohydrate too.
But again, that is just us being critical for this review. Outbreak Nutrition have done well to add an optimal dosage of L-Citrulline, so there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that.
Potassium Nitrate
We have mixed feelings about Potassium Nitrate being included in Serum pre-workout.
While many people don’t know that Potassium is a very important mineral that you need to balance out your salt/potassium levels, there’s not much need for it in a pre-workout/fat burner.
In fact, while salt get’s a bad reputation, it would make more sense to have added some salt into this pre-workout alongside potassium; salt helps reduce cramping, which is why many electrolyte drinks contain both salt & potassium.
Anyway, that’s some pretty boring knowledge for you. Ultimately, there’s nothing wrong with having Potassium Nitrate in Serum, but we would have preferred to see a key pre-workout ingredient such as Creatine Monohydrate instead.
Inositol-Stabolized-Arginine Silicate
While there aren’t many studies on Inositol-Stabolized-Arginine Silicat, the one study we saw is very positive. Now, we’ll point out that this study specifically used Nitrosignine, which is a patented form of this ingredient, so we don’t know whether this study was sponsored by the company behind Nitrosigine.
Personally, we prefer to see studies using non-branded nutrients, to get the most unbiased results. We’re not saying the study we saw was biased, but this is just our honest opinion.
So what does Inositol-Stabolized-Arginine Silicate do? Well, the study shows that it’s believed to raise your nitric oxide levels, which would further enhance your muscle pumps.
Fortunately, it doesn’t matter whether this works or not, because Outbreak Nutrition has already added an optimal dosage of L-Citrulline.
For this reason, we can consider Inositol-Stabolized-Arginine Silicate to be a good ‘bonus’ addition to Serum here.
Green Tea Extract
This is the main reason we know that Outbreak Nutrition has tried to create a pre-workout/fat burner hybrid supplement; Green Tea Extract is proven to fire-up your metabolism and promote fat loss.
However, if you’re main goal is to lose body fat and tone up, then we recommend looking for specialist fat burner supplements to get the job done instead.
Now, we’re unsure whether Outbreak Nutrition has tried to add Green Tea Extract to also add some caffeine into Serum. But as they haven’t shown you a caffeine dosage on Serum’s nutrient profile, this doesn’t seem to be the case.
Ultimately, we would have liked to have seen a sensible dosage of Caffeine Anhydrous (under 200mg per serving in pre-workouts) too; this would have helped provide you with that ‘kick’ you look for when taking pre-workouts.
Huperzia Serrata
In case you’re wondering, Huperzia Serrata is a plant that’s added to some supplements due to containing Huperzine A; this is believed to be a cognitive booster, which is why it’s most commonly added to nootropic supplements.
Now, we believe that Caffeine Anhydrous would have provided enough of a boost in focus to benefit your gym session. So ingredients solely dedicated to improving your cognition aren’t really necessary in pre-workout supplements.
Not only that, WebMD claim that Huperzine A can cause side effects including nausea, diarrhea, vomiting and high blood pressure. So it’s easy to see why we prefer to avoid Huperzine A in pre-workouts.
See Your Best Options In Our
– Top 3 Pre-Workouts Page –
Side Effects
The good news is that most ingredients in Serum won’t cause any side effects. However, as we mentioned in the last section, Huperzia Serrata has the potential to cause some side effects.
For this reason, we usually try to avoid supplements containing this ingredient. There’s simply no need to risk side effects when there are safe and effective ingredients available instead.
Here’s the potential side effects from taking Serum:
- Nausea (Huperzia Serrata)
- Diarrhea (Huperzia Serrata)
- Vomiting (Huperzia Serrata)
- High Blood Pressure (Huperzia Serrata)
Serum Review Conclusion
Overall, Serum is a respectable product that certainly has its place on the market. We’re especially happy to see that Outbreak Nutrition haven’t hidden any ingredients in proprietary blends and kept things clear & transparent instead.
However, there are a few things that we would have liked changed, in our honest opinion; the inclusion of key pre-workout ingredients such as Caffeine Anhydrous and Creatine Monohydrate would have really helped take Serum to the next level.
Not only that, we’re not convinced that Serum will be able to have much effect on fat loss. So if you’re main goal is to shred body fat, then we would advise you to choose a specialist fat burner instead.
Bottom Line: We like that Outbreak Nutrition has added an optimal dosage of L-Citrulline, which will help boost your nitric oxide levels and your muscle pumps. But it’s missing the necessary ingredients to raise your energy levels and strength in the gym, so we don’t believe it can compete with the highest rated pre-workouts, in our honest opinion.
Here’s the best natural pre-workouts on the market for:
- Energy Boosts
- Enhanced Strength & Endurance
- Increased Focus
- Skin-Splitting Muscle Pumps